The dialect has lost much of the guttural sound that
hurt one’s ear at the last place of residence;
but here is an odd squeaking accent, that distinguishes
the Tuscan of Lucca.

The place appropriated for airing, showing fine equipages,
&c. is beautiful beyond all telling; from the peculiar
shadows on the mountains. They make the bastions
of the town their Corso, but none except the nobles
can go and drive upon one part of it. I know not
how many yards of ground is thus let apart, sacred
to sovereignty; but it makes one laugh.

Our inn here is an excellent one, as far as I am concerned;
and the sallad-oil green, like Irish usquebaugh, nothing
was ever so excellent. I asked the French valet
who dresses our hair, “Si ce n’etait
pas une republique mignonne?[X]”—­“Ma
foy, madame, je la trouve plus tot la republique des
rats et des souris[Y];” replies the fellow,
who had not slept all night, I afterwards understood,
for the noise those troublesome animals made in his
room.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote X: If it were not a dear little pretty
commonwealth—­this?]

[Footnote Y: Faith, madam, I call it the republic
of the rats and mice.]

PISA.

This town has been so often described that it is as
well known in England as in Italy almost; where I,
like others, have seen the magnificent cathedral;
have examined the two pillars which support its entrance,
and which once adorned Diana’s temple at Ephesus,
one of the seven wonders of the world. Their
carving is indeed beyond all idea of workmanship;
and the possession of them is inestimable. I have
seen the old stones with inscriptions on them, bearing
date the reign of Antoninus Pius, stuck casually,
some with the letters reversed, some sloping, according
to accident merely, as it appears to me, in the body
of the great church: and I have seen the leaning
tower that Lord Chesterfield so comically describes
our English travellers eagerness to see. It is
a beautiful building though after all, and a strange
thing that it should lean so. The cylindrical
form, and marble pillars that support each story,
may rationally enough attract a stranger’s notice,
and one is sorry the lower stories have sunk from their
foundations, originally defective ones I trust they
were, though, God knows, if the Italians do not build
towers well, it is not for want either of skill or
of experience; for there is a tower to every town I
think, and commonly fabricated with elaborate nicety
and well-fixed bases. But as earthquakes and
subterranean fires here are scarcely a wonder, one
need not marvel much at seeing the ground retreat
just here. It is nearer our hand, and
quite as well worth our while to enquire, why the tower
at Bridgnorth in Shropshire leans exactly in
the same direction, and is full as much out of the
perpendicular as this at Pisa.